switching schools or not?

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Hello,

My son is 7 and will go to third grade next year. He is currently in a school where he has been for 4 years. It's a small school, with only +-12 children per class. The teachers are nice, motivated, open for IEP and any of my concerns and suggestions are appreciated, welcomed an usually put into action (after the obligated endless meetings, and not always as I would do it, but you know). He also get differtentiated curriculum, which isn't perfect, but I think I can get them to accelerate him for math after christmas break.

The school is what we call a 'method' school in Belgium, where there is a lot of emphasis on working together, learning from experience-based projects, peer-tutoring and there's a lot of group talk sessions. It is a good school, but I didn't know he had Aspergers until last year and we are worried that this kind of education is not ideal for him. It does get chaotic sometimes, and the overall idea is that children learn boundaries from each other and from themselves. This doesn't mean that everything is tolerated, but there are more 'agreements' being made than rules being set. Way too many, and way too confusing, from an aspie point of view, but they're working on it.

My son has been struggling with the group projects and the peer-tutoring, for obvious reasons. He's not doing poorly, in fact, for an Aspie, I'd say he's doing GREAT. My concern is that is is very challenging for him, therefor exhausting -this shows. He's usually very touchy and grumpy after school, and the first months of this year were incredibly hard, with a lot of overloading and semi-meltdowns at home. Now, he's doing better, but I'm still worried sending him to this kind of school is pushing him too much, with all the emphasis on social skills and the sometimes charming, but sometimes overwhelming chaos.
On the other hand, he has some good friends over there, he doesn't want to leave and there is no other school in the entire city with so few children per class (in most schools, it's easily 25 children per class). Also, I'm very doubtful that I will find this level of understanding in other teacher's teams.
His therapist doens't have a straight-forward advice on this. She basically agrees with the pros and the cons and tells me I need to decide.

Any thoughts on what I should do, or maybe which questions I should ask myself to come to a decision?

If he has a good social base and is part of the group I would be reluctant to move him.
My own experience with method schools was a mixed one. A lot depends on the teacher and their willingness to accomodate and also their ability to admit failure if need be.

In our case it all went horribly pear-shaped and we had our daughter start in Buitengewoon Onderwijs Type 3 after the autumn break. Her school is a mix of Type3/Type7, she has HFA. Best move for her as she had become socially excluded (she was bullied and when that was adressed the social exclusion started proper). Since there she has bloomed open again.

If he is happy in a social context I would be reluctant to move him. But that is me...

Focusing on group things would be worst possible education for me.

Reading your post, I see a lot of advantages in this school. Small classes, the IEP process sounds thoughtful and well implemented, he has friends, and wants to stay. The only negatives I hear are that he's tired at the end of the day, which would likely be true at a traditional school as well, and that the method style of instruction isn't a perfect fit. What would you gain by moving to a traditional school? You'd be giving up a lot that you would be hard pressed to find there. As long as he is learning, has friends, and isn't asking to leave, I would recommend staying put.

My therapist has given me this wonderful bit of advice pertaining to my children which I'll pass along:

"Push them as much as they can tolerate"

It sounds like your child is tolerating, even if it is a struggle. Life is going to be a struggle, but nothing good in life comes easy. If things get worse, then of course reconsider. But it sounds like there is a decent balance at the moment. If he is enjoying his friendships, then he is having pleasure at the same time. If it was all hardship and tears, and he was too tired to enjoy any life at all, then that would be a problem. But I don't see that happening from what you've said. You can gently guide him to showing more consideration and civility to people at home despite his exhaustion, but I believe even NT people alike could benefit from being taught that.

Thanks for your feedback! En hey, een Belg!

Any suggestions on how I could counter the sometimes excessive emphasis on social skills and him feeling inadequate because of this? I mean, they're a loving bunch of hippies, but sometimes it's pretty clear they value social skills and sharing more than intellectual abilities, which he has in abundance. I don't want him to develop low self esteem because of this.

Tricky one.

Is it the social pressure on yourself or on your son that you want/need to counteract?

Social contacts, networking, call it what you like, I have learned, are pretty much the foundation of method in the case of Freinet. Steiner on the other hand is on a different level and more emphasis is placed on the child's inner world rather than their social skills. But they do expect more uniformity so to speak. Steiner parents were chilled out and the whole set up placed a lot less emphasis on social skills. It was the thought of having to celebrate their festivals over the next six years hence we change to Freinet after kleuter years.

After the change I never clicked with the other parents who's kids were the popular crowd. As a result my daughter never clicked with their kids.
There was a few parents that I tried to socialize with but I really don't do social chit chat so that never lasted long. And then their kids would think me strange for not being like the NT's they are used to. She stopped being invited to parties by the beginning of YR3. It mattered to her and her self esteem went down the drain, especially in the last year (YR4) when there was no rapport between me and the teacher. Not that she was enough of a teacher to even admit that!

Another though come to mind. I know for a fact that some children with autism in Belgium can be accomodated in Type7.

Maybe worth looking into?
I realize Buitengewoon Onderwijs/Special Needs carries a stigma in Belgium. But being an ex-pat that only returned to get our daughter her education I don't care much for the shame culture that is Belgium.
She has opened up totally since she started her Type3 school even to the point she will wear skirts again! Looking back now her emotional problems basically stem to a great deal from her experiences at her old school. She misses the place the place though and is too young to realize it has probably done her more harm then good at the time.

On him. The group sessions, the peer-tutoring, the group projects. These things are hard for him, he's constantly being challenged, which I think could give him the feeling of being inadequate.

I know there's Aspies in type 7, but as long as these are not Aspie classes but 'oh, there's a bit of room left here, let's just put them here, because there's some icons on the wal', I'm not sending him there. Also, his shrink thinks it wouldn't be good for him since he's exceptionally smart and there are very few high IQ children in BO. Her words, not mine. I don't care about the stigma either, though.